A Brazil never seen.

The Father of Brazilian Football

Brazil. Home of the most famous international shirt in World football. The birthplace of some of the games greatest ever players. A country whose inclusion in World football remains as important now as it was more than seven decades ago. The home of football as it is, but it hasn’t always been that way.

Sculpted in cast iron and erected in Bangu, a suburb of Rio de Janeiro is the statue of Thomas Donohoe, a Scottish born man, who travelled to Brasil in search of work. But despite Donohoe influence in Brasil, he is overlooked as the original founder of football in Brasil, with many believing Charles Miller to be the father of football.

Born in Sao Paulo in 1874, Miller, the son of a Scottish railway engineer and Brazilian-born mother, he was sent to school in Southampton, where at the age of 10 was picked for the first team…